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------------------------------------------------------------ CHESSTD Version 2.00 by Stephen Wharry ------------------------------------------------------------ CHESSTD is a program for the tournament director to assist in making the pairings, pairing charts, wallcharts, calculates tie breaks, and more for chess tournaments. CHESSTD makes pairings (both Swiss and round robin style) based on the pairing rules found in "USCF Rules of Chess". However, the tournament director has complete freedom to modify the pairings to his/her satisfaction using a powerful pairings editor. Error checking routines are programmed into CHESSTD to insure equalization of color, alternation of color, equality in pairing, and no multiple pairings between two players or multiple one point byes. CHESSTD is compatible with and written in conjunction with CHESSRPT, a program written to generate crosstables and tournament reports to USCF. Thus CHESSTD and CHESSRPT comprise a complete package for automation of the majority of TD functions before, during, and after a tournament. The program will work on any IBM compatible DOS based system. DOS 3.2 or greater is recommended! This program is being marketed on the Shareware concept. This means you may try out this program free of charge. HOWEVER! If you find this program of use, you are required to become a registered user by remitting $10 to Stephen Wharry 4842 Clearview Circle Bartlesville, OK 74006 Registered users will receive information on free updates of this program and other chess related software. CHESSTD page 2 CHESSTD Version 2.00 1 Installation of CHESSTD 4 Starting up CHESSTD 4 Using CHESSTD 5 Selecting commands/entering data 5 Selecting players from the player's list 6 Selecting from a pop-up list 7 Selecting the output device 7 Quit 7 File 8 File - Open 8 File - Save 8 File - Purge 8 File - Directory 9 Edit 9 Edit - New (Tournament) 9 Edit - New (Players) 9 Edit - Format 10 Edit - Tourney 10 Tournament name 10 Number of Rounds 10 Date 11 Section/class 11 City, State, Zip 11 Sponsoring affiliate and ID# 11 TD's 11 Edit - Cards 12 Edit Player's Card 12 Name 12 USCF number 12 Rating 13 Round information 13 Color 14 Opponent 14 Result 15 Edit Round Information 15 Add Player 15 Delete Player 16 Adding/Deleting players after the first round 16 Edit - Pairings 16 Quit 17 Paste 17 Cut 17 Add 18 Subtract 18 Black/white 18 CHESSTD page 3 Print 18 Print - Wallchart 19 Print - Pairings 19 Print - List 19 Print - Cards 19 Tie Breaks 19 TD 20 Swiss pairings 20 Round robin pairings 21 Edit pairings 21 Assign byes 21 Pair as... 22 Enter results 22 Forfeit player 22 Withdraw player 22 CHESSTD 22 DOShell 23 If you have problems 23 CHESSTD page 4 Installation of CHESSTD Installation of CHESSTD is simply a matter of copying the program CHESSTD.EXE to the directory or floppy disk of your choice. (Gosh, that's sounds hard doesn't it!!!) You can 'install' as many copies of CHESSTD in as many directories or floppies as you want. Since CHESSTD supports DOS paths, you could even choose to have the program on one directory or floppy and the data on another directory or floppy. Or you could keep data for a number of tournaments scattered in different directories or floppy disks. IMPORTANT! If want to handle round robin pairings as well, you will need to copy the file CHESSTD.RND along with CHESSTD.EXE to the directories or floppies where CHESSTD will reside. CHESSTD will automatically look for CHESSTD.RND when making round robin pairings. Types of files CHESSTD creates three types of files, wallchart files, pairing files and user defined files. The first contains the wallchart data as are defined primarily for the Swiss style tournament. The extension for these files is '.WCT'. The pairing files contain the pairings defined for a given round and have the extension '.CTD.'. The CTD files are usually overwritten once a new set of pairings have been made. The fourth type of file created by CHESSTD is the user defined file. This file is usually a copy of a wallchart, crosstable, or game report 'printed' to a file. The filename and extension for these files are defined by the user. Starting up CHESSTD To start CHESSTD, simply type CHESSTD at the DOS prompt. (Whew, that might be a little tough?) The files CHESSTD creates will reside in the default directory, unless a path is specified as part of the filename. Alternatively you could specify the filename on the command line. The filename (and directory) you specify will be loaded automatically upon startup. CHESSTD page 5 Example: C>CHESSTD D:\CHESS\66open Will run CHESSTD and automatically load the wallchart file called 66open.WCT from the D:\CHESS directory. Using CHESSTD Selecting commands/entering data Commands are selected in one of the following fashions: Type the single letter corresponding to the first letter of the command. (Tough HUH!) OR Use the tab, shift-tab, or cursor keys to highlight the command you wish to activate. Then press RETURN/ENTER. OR Use the mouse, if you have one, to position the cursor over the command and click a mouse button. (Sorry if I confuse you by interchanging RETURN and ENTER for the large key located near your right little pinkie. IBM in it's wisdom decided to change the world overnight and re-label this key. If you see RETURN, read ENTER!) ENTER at any time will activate the default selection which is either highlighted, enclosed in <>, or is the first item on a list. The most common example of the latter is the 0) Quit item in the list of chess players. When prompted for data, you may either press the enter key and accept the data being displayed, or you may type in new data. Most of the data input of CHESSTD uses what I call a limited line editor which allows you to type over any data displayed on the line. You may also use the home, end and cursor keys to move around on the line. All data between home and end will be read back into the program once you press the enter key. The insert, delete, and backspace keys may be used to add or delete characters in the line. Besides the ENTER key, the ESCAPE key has a special meaning for the limited line editor. Pressing the ESCAPE key during data input will append a 'Q' to the end of the data and immediately exit the data input for that item. In several cases I handle this by removing the 'Q' from the data and exiting from the routines. This resembles using the ESCAPE key to back up or abort data input screens. Bear in mind that this is not always so. CHESSTD page 6 A special editing mode is activated during the routine to edit the pairings. In this case, there are four commands that are active. These are explained in detail below. However, note that the 'cut' command is activated by the Del key and the 'paste' command is activated by the Ins key. Selecting players from the player's list A number of CHESSTD routines will present you with a list of players. The names of the players may be listed in different colors depending if the player is assigned a bye for the current round, or the sum of his/her score with the opponent's score adds up to one. The color of the player's name doesn't prevent you from selecting that player. When requested to select a player from a list displayed on the screen, any alphanumeric character(s) can be entered. If the data you enter is numeric, the data will be interpreted as a number. If the data you enter is alphabetical, the first player's name that matches the characters typed will be selected. For example: If a player is listed on the screen as "16) Wharry, Stephen", he could be selected by typing in the number 16. OR By typing in as much of the last name as is unique. Thus, if no other players has a last name beginning with W, then typing in a 'W' will select "Wharry". Note: Capitals are ignored. OR You can use the mouse to select the player either by clicking on the player's number or on the player's last name. If the player's name is entered with only one space separating the last and first name, CHESSTD will match the whole name. If not, CHESSTD will match only the portion of the name clicked on. In addition to typing in alphanumeric data, the cursor keys can be used to manipulate the player's list on the screen. Pressing the cursor keys will move the player's list up/down one player. Pressing the page up/page down keys will move the player's list up/down by 16 players at a time. The home key will begin the list at player #1 and the end key will end the list on the last player. CHESSTD page 7 Selecting from a pop-up list In several points of CHESSTD, you will be presented with a list of items with the first item highlighted. This is a pop-up menu. You can press the escape key and exit without selecting any of the items, or you can use the cursor keys to position the cursor (highlight) on the item you want. After positioning the cursor, press the "ENTER" key and that item will be selected. Alternatively, you can use the mouse to scroll through the pop-up menu and click on the desired item. Selecting the output device In the print routines you are asked to select a device for output. The options are a printer, a file, or the screen. The default is the screen. If you select the printer as the output device, the output will be directed to the line printer attached to the computer. (Well what do you know. Isn't life weird!) CHESSTD was written to interact with an EPSON printer, however no special codes were embedded in the software. The most complex code used is ASCII 12, which is commonly used as the printer control command for a form feed. Note: For pretties, the IBM special graphic characters have been used for printout of the wallchart and pairing cards. This may yield weird characters, if you're printer is not capable of printing these special characters. (I suggest MPMPrint, a shareware program to substitute psuedo-graphic characters to the printer). Selection of the screen as output will display the information requested, on the screen. Selection of a file as the output 'device' is a little bit more complex, but not much. After selecting the file 'device', CHESSTD requests a filename for the output file. You must specify the full filename including the extension and the directory. The latter is only necessary if you wish the output to go to a directory other than the default directory. Quit In the main menu, the QUIT command will generate a button box asking you if you really want to exit. Enter 'N' to return to CHESSTD or 'Y' to exit back to DOS. In most of the other menus, the QUIT command will return you to the previous menu or to the main menu. CHESSTD page 8 File The file menu contains those commands used to manipulate the wallchart files. The two most used functions will most likely be 'Open' and 'Save'. These commands are detailed below. File - Open The 'Open' command is the opposite to the 'Save' command. You specify a directory and a filename. If you specify the extension, it will be ignored. If you use a wildcards as part, or all, of the filename, you can press the 'F1' key (function key one), and a directory listing of the appropriate files will be displayed. Use the cursor keys or mouse to select the file to be opened. In addition to the wallchart file, a file containing the extension 'CTD' is also opened and read in at this time. This file contains the current round number and the current pairings. These pairings can be edited just as if the pairings had just been made. File - Save The 'Save' command will save the current data to the file specified. After selecting the save command, you are prompted for the filename. Again any normal DOS file specifier is acceptable. You needn't specify the extension since CHESSTD will use 'WCT' regardless of the extension you type in. If you wish the file to be stored in another directory/disk besides the default, you must specify the new path at this time. In addition to the wallchart file, the Save command will write the current pairings to the same path specified for the wallchart file. These pairings can then be edited in the future to rebuild the pairings for the round, change color allocations, or anything else you might want to do with the pairings. File - Purge The 'Purge' command is used to purge/delete the specified files. CHESSTD assumes you will want to purge WCT files and will create the filename on this basis. You can use wildcards and change the directories at this point. CHESSTD will prompt for each file prior to purging the file. Answer yes or no. CHESSTD page 9 File - Directory The 'Directory' command allows you to obtain a directory of all wallchart files. After selecting this item you are prompted for the filename. At this point you may enter any normal DOS file specifier. Here also you can use wildcards and change directories. CHESSTD will show the results of the directory command in a window. If more files are selected than will fit in the window, you will be prompted to continue. Edit All of the data entered into CHESSTD can be entered or edited using this command. The operation is very straight forward. As you are prompted for data, either enter new data, edit the old data, or press the ENTER key to accept the data. You may use the delete, insert, backspace key as well as the cursor keys to change the displayed data. CHESSTD uses a limited line editor. All characters typed on the screen between the 'Home' position and the 'End' will be read back into CHESSTD. To find the Home and End, simply press the appropriate keys. The right/left cursor keys can also be used to find the beginning and end of the 'line'. Edit - New (Tournament) After selecting the New command, you are prompted to select either a new tournament or a new player. The former is to be used when you are setting up a new tournament and wish to initialize all the tournament information. The latter is used to add players to the current tournament wallchart. After selecting a new tournament, you will go through four routines, the Edit Format, the Edit Tournament, the Edit TD's, and the New Players (Add players) routines. These are detailed below. Edit - New (Players) By selecting the 'New Players' option, you are taken directly to the Edit Players routine for player x, where x is one greater than the total number of players entered into the wallchart. You will only be able to add players to the tournament if the current round is round #1. For more information on the Add Players routine, see below. CHESSTD page 10 Edit - Format There are only two types of tournaments supported by CHESSTD, the Swiss and the round robin. One difference between the Swiss and round robin formats is that the Swiss format shows a cumulative score for each round and the round robin simply shows the resulting score for that round. A second difference is in how CHESSTD does the pairings. If a tournament is defined as a round robin, CHESSTD reads a datafile called CHESSTD.RND to determine the pairings. Otherwise the pairings are made based on the Swiss system. Although I don't know why you would want to, you can switch the tournament format from Swiss to round robin, and visa versa, at any time. Note: Regardless of the format, CHESSTD assumes each pairing/game is worth one point. Edit - Tourney This routine is used to edit tournament header information such as the tournament name, number of rounds, date, section/class, location of the tournament and the sponsoring affiliate information. These are detailed below. Tournament name Here you are prompted for the tournament name. This CANNOT be left blank as this will quit the edit routine and NOT clear all the old tournament information. If you decide you didn't want to create a new tournament at this time, press the ENTER key. If you do want to create a new tournament, which is the whole reason for this program, enter the name you (or others) have bestowed on this tournament. Number of Rounds If the tournament format is a Swiss style, you must enter the number of rounds. The number of rounds for a round robin tournament is set by the number of players. In a similar manner to the tournament name, the number of rounds CANNOT be blank, since a tournament of zero rounds is undefined! The default is 5 rounds since the 5 round Swiss is fairly common. To change the number of rounds, backspace over the 5 and type in the number of rounds played. Currently CHESSTD cannot handle any tournaments over 25 rounds. (And that's a long time to play chess me boyo). If you are interested in more rounds, drop me a line and I'll send you a modified program. CHESSTD page 11 Date Next you are prompted for the date. This is self- explanatory. Although any ASCII data is accepted, if none is entered the program will shove the current date into this spot. (OW, THAT HURT!) Since the 'date' will show up on the USCF report, I recommend you use the starting and stopping dates for the tournament. Section/class Next you are prompted for the Section/class for this tournament. An example is the RESERVE section of the NATIONAL OPEN. As with the date, this is a pure ASCII variable and you may elect to enter data at this point that is not section/class data! If no section/class is entered, CHESSTD sets the Section/class to 'Not applicable'. City, State, Zip The next prompt is for the city, state, and zip where the tournament was held, again another ASCII variable. However, it is used in the USCF report so you might want to enter the data, otherwise you may have to write this in at a latter date. Sponsoring affiliate and ID# The sponsoring affiliate is the name of the USCF affiliate sponsoring the tournament. Again, used primarily for the USCF report as is the ID #, which is USCF's affiliate number for the club or organization sponsoring the tournament. (Gosh Mr. Wizard, this sounds real tough!!!!) TD's This routine is used to edit/enter the data for the tournament directors. CHESSTD allows up to 9 assistant TD's in addition to the chief tournament director. The first prompt is for the name of the chief tournament director. As with the tournament name and the number of rounds, this CANNOT be left blank. In fact in this case, you are not allowed quit or continue in CHESSTD until you enter something for a chief TD's name. (This is most likely you yourself!) After entering the name of the chief tournament director, you are prompted for his/her ID number. For the chief tournament director, you are also asked for his/her level. This is for the USCF report. Currently (1990) the levels are CLUB, LOCAL, SENIOR, and then on to the national levels! CHESSTD page 12 The names and ID numbers for the assistant tournament directors are next requested. By pressing an ENTER (entering a blank) or 'END' for the name of an assistant TD, CHESSTD assumes you are finished. Edit - Cards After selecting this command you are given the option of editing a player's card, editing a specific round results, adding a player to the tournament, and deleting a player from the tournament. These latter two commands should only be done in the first round since they reshuffle the player's pairing numbers. More about this latter. Edit Player's Card After selecting this command, a list of players is displayed. Select the player you wish to edit, the program will then present you with the player's data (if any). You may select the last option (all) to edit all of the players. The program will present you with the data for player 1 and proceed one player at a time until you reach the last player in the tournament. Note: Under the edit function, the escape key can be used to 'tab' through the players. During the player's name, rating and color information the escape key, or entering a 'Q' as the last letter, will jump from the current player to the next player to be edited. At other times the escape key will append the letter 'Q' to the data being entered! Name The name should be input with last name first, followed by first name and middle initial. USCF would like you to use the name exactly as it is recorded in their records. This is probably a GOOD idea especially if you have two or more John Smiths. If you press the ENTER key with no data present (i.e. enter no player name) CHESSTD assumes you are finished entering data for now and will exit the editing routine! USCF number The ID number should be the USCF number assigned to each player. If a player has no USCF number, then typing in NEW is acceptable as is most anything else you wish to type. Bear in mind though that the reports were set up to display a maximum of 9 letters, so if you type in data with more CHESSTD page 13 than 9 letters you risk screwing up the PRETTY REPORTS THAT I HAVE WORKED SO HARD ON SO WATCH IT BUSTER!!!!! Rating The rating is a number! Usually it is the official rating being used for a particular player for this tournament. Since some players are fairly active, their current rating may not reflect their true rating. This screws things up in trying to generate an exact copy of the rating report you receive back from USCF. Not to worry, after you find out their true ratings, you can edit their ratings and regenerate the USCF crosstable exactly! (Well maybe not EXACTLY, but pretty durned close. It seems USCF does a few fudgy things I haven't figured out yet.) For unrated players, I have been using the value of zero for their ratings. Therefore, zero is translated in CHESSTD as 'Unrated' or 'UNR' depending on the routine. During the edit modes, the rating value may be 'entered' by pressing the escape key at the end of the rating. The rating will be set correctly, but the program will skip input of round data. Round information The round information is the data that will be used to generate the Swiss pairings, wallcharts, and crosstables (the latter using CHESSRPT). The data input is set up to accept what is usually shown on my pairing cards. I'm sorry if this seems a little egotistical, but hey I'm writing the program not YOU. Seriously, if you have suggestions as to what you might like to see accepted as round information, drop me a line and I'll try to get it into the next version of the program! The screen shows pairing card cells for five or less rounds. More rounds are shown when needed. In each of these pairing card cells you must input the color, opponent, and the result. The exception is byes and forfeits which are handled a little differently. If the information relates to another player on the wallchart, his data will SIMULTANEOUSLY be entered without your having to bother with it. The simultaneous entry of data means that if player 1 played player 22 in round 1, the data you enter for player 1 will be interpreted and entered for player 22 at the same time. You will get a chance to review the data at a later time, i.e. when you are inputting data for player 22! Since pressing ENTER will accept the data displayed, when you come CHESSTD page 14 to player 22 you only need double check the data and press the ENTER key three times to accept the color, opponent, and result! Example: If you put in the color W for player I against player J with a result of 0.5. The player J's data will be set for the color B, opponent I, and a score of 0.5. Color You must enter alphabetic data in this box. This could be either W for white, or B for black or any of the following legal round descriptors: W - white B - black BYE (or B--)* - bye FW or F - forfeit win FL or X - forfeit loss FD or Z - forfeit draw U - unplayed game WD - withdraw esc or Q - quit entering data *The dashes are necessary to distinguish from the color allocation black. This command WD will immediately exit from entering round data and set all remaining rounds to U--, for unplayed games. The forfeits, withdrawal, and unplayed games will automatically compute the appropriate scores and continue to the next pairing card cell. Byes automatically skip the opponent, but still request a score for that round as they may be full point or half point byes. Entering a Q, or any text ending with a Q, or pressing the ESCAPE key will immediately exit you from the round input data and proceed to the next player leaving the original data unchanged. This is handy, if you are editing round 1 and all the other rounds are OK. If the data you enter is illegal, then the program will beep informing you that YOU DID SOMETHING WRONG, NAAAAA. Opponent The opponent number is a non-zero, positive number and the pairing number of the opponent!? (Does that make sense or what!) This number will be used to determine what other player's data will be altered besides the player currently CHESSTD page 15 being edited. The opponent number cannot be equal to the current player since USCF and I frown on player's playing a game against themselves! Result The result is the result of the specific round and must be equal to 1, 0.5, or 0. If an incorrect value is input, the program will again beep at you and allow you to put in the correct result. As you enter the result, the cumulative score is displayed under the column Tot. Edit Round Information This routine is useful in editing the round information directly, skipping editing the full player's card. However note, the round information can also be entered below under the Enter Results subroutine in the TD routine. After selecting this command you are requested for the round to be edited. Simply position the cursor over the appropriate round and press the return. As with the Edit Player's Card above, you are prompted for the player to edit. You are then shown the player's pairing card with the cursor positioned on the round you selected above. All cautions above relating to "Round information" are applicable here as well since you are using the same routine. Remember, whenever you change a player's information you will be changing his/her opponent's information as well. Add Player WARNING: You should only add players to a tournament during round one. As you add players to the tournament, the player you add is assigned a pairing number based on his/her rating. You needn't worry about what order you add players to the tournament as CHESSTD will determine where the player fits in and adjust all pairing numbers appropriately. The advantage of this is that you can add players of disparate strength and CHESSTD will AUTOMATICALLY keep track of the pairing numbers. The disadvantage is that if you add players to a tournament after the first round, you may have to do some shuffling. CHESSTD page 16 Delete Player WARNING: You should only delete players from a tournament during round one. If a player has already played one game in the tournament, you should NEVER delete that player from the tournament. You needn't worry about what order you delete players from the tournament as CHESSTD will adjust all pairing numbers appropriately. The advantage of this is that you can delete players of disparate strength and CHESSTD will AUTOMATICALLY keep track of the pairing numbers. Adding/Deleting players after the first round If in spite of the warnings above you decide to add or delete a player during the second or subsequent rounds, there is actually a way around the safeguards I've put in. First reset the default round by redoing the first round pairings and having CHESSTD rebuild the pairings (See Pairings later). Next add/delete the appropriate player. If you added a player, assign that player a bye in each round that he/she did not play in. If you delete a player, assign a bye to each opponent of the deleted player depending on the result of the game. Physically redo the pairings for each round until you get to the current round. This step will reset all the opponents pairing numbers to the new pairing numbers. I can't emphasize enough the importance of taking care in using these commands after the pairings have been made for the first round. Since adding and deleting players from the tournament rebuilds the pairing numbers, and since the pairing numbers are what designates the pairings, it is highly important to insure these numbers are accurate. Edit - Pairings You enter the Edit - pairings routine either through the TD routine or the edit routine. The Edit - pairings routine will present you with a list of the current pairings. At this point you can manipulate the pairings in any manner you care to. In fact, it is possible to assign every single player byes, five blacks in a row, pair a 0 with a 4, etc. CHESSTD page 17 My philosophy in putting this routine together is to allow the TD the ultimate in flexibility and yet maintain a well ordered approach to the pairing process. You have several options in the Edit - pairings routine, which are described below. These commands will be executed at the point where the cursor (highlight) is positioned. Thus, if the cursor is positioned on player C and you execute the Cut command, player C will be cut. All of the commands below have key equivalent on the IBM keypad. Paste=Ins, Cut=Del, Add=+, Subtract=-, and Black/white=*. Quit Executed by clicking on the command, pressing the Q key, or the escape key. Any player not assigned a pairing or a bye at this point will be assigned a full point bye. Paste The paste/cut commands are used to move single players around the Edit - pairing screen. This command can be executed by clicking the mouse cursor on the command, pressing the first letter of the command, or using the Ins key on the keypad. The result of the paste command will be to present the TD with a list of players who are not currently assigned a pairing for this round (non-paired player's list). If there are no available players, no list will be presented. If you press the escape key after being presented with a list, no changes will be made. Otherwise, the player who is highlighted will be pasted into the current cursor position. If there is a player already at that position, that player will be placed in the non-paired player's list. If the player you selected has already played the opponent, a warning beep will sound and you will not be allowed to make the pairing. If you really want to pair two player's a second time in a tournament, you can go out and edit the pairing cards and rebuild the pairings. Cut The cut command is used to remove a player from the pairing routine and place him into the non-paired player's list. Once here, the player is available to be pasted anywhere on the pairing screen. This command can be executed by CHESSTD page 18 clicking the mouse on the command, pressing C, or using the Del key. Add This command is used to add a blank pairing line to the pairing screen. This is used if you have two players on the non-paired player's list and wish to pair them. The pairing line will be added onto the bottom of the pairing list regardless of the position of the cursor. Activate this command by clicking on the command, pressing A, or the plus key on the keypad. Subtract This command is used to delete a pairing from the pairing screen. If there are players on this line, they will be added to the non-paired player's list. This routine is used primarily when CHESSTD couldn't pair all players and generates two players with one point byes. When this happens, the TD must go in and decide what pairings need to be made and shuffle the players around. After making the pairings, it is a good idea to subtract the blank pairing lines on the pairing screen. This command is activated by clicking on the command, pressing the S key, or the minus key on the keypad. Black/white This command is used to toggle the color assignments for the players on the pairing screen. Activating the command once will reverse the color assignments. Activating the command a second time will toggle the color assignments back to the original assignments. This command is activated by clicking the command, pressing the B, or the asterisk key on the keypad. Print After selecting the print option, you are prompted for the output device. Previous versions, required you to select the output device prior to each printing request. I felt it seemed more logical to request the device only once and not get in the way. If you select the screen (the default), the results will be displayed on the screen along with the tournament header information. If you select a printer or file as the output CHESSTD page 19 device, the results 'printed' will be identical. Thus, you can output your wallchart to a file and print it latter. If you select a 'file' as the output device, you are prompted for a filename in standard DOS format including directories and extensions. If you press the enter key without entering a filename, the output file will be set to TEMP.PRT in the default directory. All subsequent print requests will print to the output file. To print data to multiple output files you will have to exit the print routine and reenter it specifying a new filename. Print - Wallchart Printing of the wallchart is used if you want to print out a copy of the wallchart to be posted. If you print the wallchart to the screen, you will be prompted to continue or to Break. Print - Pairings This command will print out a copy of the pairing chart in the form of board number, player playing white, and player playing black. There will be spaces to mark the results for each player. Print - List This command will print out a copy of the pairing list. My definition of the pairing list is a list of players starting with player one and proceeding to the last player. For each player the color assignment, the board number, the opponent's pairing number and a spot for the result is listed. Print - Cards This routine will print a copy of the pairing cards. You are prompted for the round and this round will be the last round on the card unless more rounds will fit. Although this command can be used to print out copies of the pairing cards for each player, it seems a little silly since the pairings can all be done by CHESSTD. However, for those people who want a hardcopy of the pairing cards, here it is! Tie Breaks The additional two columns on the pairing cards are the tie breaks. These are recalculated each time the card is printed to the screen so they represent an accurate snapshot of the current situation. Column A represents tie breaks CHESSTD page 20 based on the Solkov system where the final scores of the opponents are added together. Column B represents the tie breaks based on the cumulative system. This latter can easily be checked by summing up the Tot column. TD The TD command includes the routines to pair a round, assign byes, enter the results, forfeit players, and withdraw players, i.e. the majority of functions of a TD during a chess tournament. Pair round After selecting this command, you are prompted for the round. After selecting the appropriate round CHESSTD will make the pairings based on the tournament format. The specifics are detailed below. If the pairings have already been made for a given round, the information should be listed on the pairing cards. In the event of CHESSTD encountering previous pairings, you are presented with the option to redo the pairings for the round or to rebuild the pairings from the information on the pairing cards. Unless you are wanting to recreate the pairings from a previous round, you usually will want to have CHESSTD redo the pairings. Swiss pairings As mentioned elsewhere, CHESSTD will pair a Swiss style tournament following the pairing rules in "USCF Official Rules of Chess". CHESSTD recognizes the odd-man rule, pairing conflicts, score groups, color equalization, color alternation, and will assign full point byes (preferably to the lowest rated players in the lowest score group). All things being well behaved, you will never have to modify the pairings that CHESSTD will make for you. However, not all things are well behaved, which is the reason I built the powerful pairing editor routine above. For the first round, CHESSTD will arbitrarily assign colors for the first board based on a random number generator. The colors are then alternated through the rest of the pairings. For subsequent rounds, CHESSTD computes the color allocation and maximizes the color equalization, and alternation. If CHESSTD finds that two players have already played, CHESSTD will attempt to switch the lower ranked player with the lower ranked player from the next pairing. If this works out, well and good, if not, CHESSTD may assign both CHESSTD page 21 players full point byes and have the TD work out the specifics of pairing these two players. For cases where color allocation is not optimum, CHESSTD will again switch the lower ranked players attempting to solve the problem. If no solution is found, CHESSTD will assign the higher ranked player his/her due color. Round robin pairings The round robin pairings are located in a file called CHESSTD.RND and are taken directly from "USCF Official Rules of Chess". CHESSTD will not modify the pairings in any fashion from those presented in the rulebook. If players withdraw from the tournament, you should consult the rulebook to determine if color allocations may switch. The file CHESSTD.RND MUST be in the same directory/floppy as CHESSTD.EXE. If CHESSTD can't find this file, it will give you an error "Can't find file". If this happens, Shell out to DOS and make sure CHESSTD.RND is present in the default directory. The file CHESSTD.RND contains the round robin pairings for tournaments up to 24 players. If you want to hold a round robin with more than 24 players, you can edit CHESSTD.RND and add the appropriate pairings. Edit pairings This is another entry into the Edit pairings routine described above. Assign byes This routine is used to assign, or deassign, byes for players. If you want to assign a given player(s) byes, you should enter this routine and assign the byes PRIOR to pairing the round. Assigning byes to a player will remove the player from being automatically paired by CHESSTD. After selecting the round, you are again presented with a list of players. Those players that already are assigned byes will be printed in a different color from the rest of the players. You can clear this by selecting the player and assigning the player a "Clear bye". This will clear the pairing card entry for the sected round and free up the player for CHESSTD to pair. Other options after selecting a player is to assign the player a 1, 0.5, or 0 point bye. The latter option is for a player who is skipping a round. CHESSTD page 22 Pair as... This routine was included to allow you to change the score of one player without affecting the score of his/her opponent. As the command indicates, the routine is used to pair a player as a win, draw, loss. This routine would be used to assign "results" to players in the middle of an adjourned game to allow CHESSTD to pair the next round. Example: Say player one and player five have an adjourned third round. To make the pairings for round four, you have to have scores for these two players. If you use the normal routines, then every time you change player one's score you adjust player five's score. Now player one thinks he's winning and player five think's it's a draw. Enter the Pair as... routine, select round three, and select player one and player five assigning them the provisional scores based on their expectations of the adjourned game. Now you can pair round four. Enter results After selecting the round, you select the player and the result for the player. Player's whose results have already been entered will be displayed in a different color. If you're unsure whether the results have been entered, reenter them as this will cause no problem at all! The opponent's results will automatically be calculated based on a total of one point per game. Forfeit player Select the round and the player to be forfeited. You have three options, a forfeit win, forfeit loss, and a forfeit draw. The opponents results will automatically be updated. Withdraw player Use this routine to remove a player from a tournament. The player will continue to appear on the non-paired player's list. CHESSTD This routine will take you to CHESSRPT, the sister program for CHESSTD. CHESSRPT is used to print wallcharts, crosstables, and USCF reports using CHESSTD wallchart files. If you use CHESSTD to direct a tournament, you needn't do anything with CHESSRPT except print the reports out. CHESSTD page 23 DOShell DOShell is nothing more than the SHELL you may or may not have heard so much about. After shelling to DOS you can run commands and even programs just as if you were at the command line right after boot up. To get back into the CHESSTD program at the point you stopped, type in 'exit' followed by the ENTER key. If you have problems If you have problems try to work them out yourself!!!! All kidding aside, I have tried to address all problems you might have in the manual above. I am associated with the two major BBS systems with the following addresses and would be glad to help you out any way. GENIE S. WHARRY COMPUSERVE 71531,3125 or even the mundane address Stephen Wharry 4842 Clearview Circle Bartlesville, OK 74006 Drop me a line, electronically or otherwise, an I'll try to solve your problem. I must admit there are most likely still bugs in this program as I have NEVER found a program that has reached the released stage that does not have bugs. For future releases of CHESSTD or other chess related software, drop me a line. I already have what I consider an excellent chess editor/personal database program (CHESSEDT), a good program for keeping track of ratings for your club or organization (CHESSCLB), and a chess tournament director (CHESSTD).